


Bring Your Sweet Lovin'

by poprocks



Series: And I Love You So [2]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Denial, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Sharing a Bed, also they listen to the beatles together and it's cute as shit, big spoon!gamora, gamora is supportive and there for him, peter is terrible at feelings and he bottles his up forever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-12-15 04:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11797980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poprocks/pseuds/poprocks
Summary: Official agenda for the evening: get in bed, stare at ceiling, listen to something he hasn’t heard on the Zune yet. That’s a pretty okay way to send off a shitty week, right?





	Bring Your Sweet Lovin'

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kanoodle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kanoodle/gifts).



> YOOOOO part 1 of a birthday gift for @kanoodle/ **kitandkanoodle**. i was only going to write one thing, and then i ended up with two things half-written so i finished both.
> 
> basically, peter is shit at dealing with his grief and trying to cope with anything at all, and gamora is there for him anyway.

God, it’s been a hell of a day.

Just once, Peter would like it if anything could go _right_ for them. Sure, the Guardians get shit done, and they usually come out the other side pretty okay (except on… a couple of occasions, but Peter’s done a halfway decent job shoving every last detail of Ego into a dark, tiny box that he never has to look at). But everything always seems to get more complicated than it needs to be. Playing escort to a Nova Corps delivery ended with a bunch of would-be robbers trying to blast the _Milano_ outta the stars. Picking off a gang of thugs on a tiny moon went from six guys to thirty-six. And a gigantic, spine-covered pterodactyl thing nearly carried Groot off to its nest while they were trying to shoot down a second one of those weird assholes.

Scratch that – it’s been a hell of a _week._

Peter likes to be on the move, likes to always have something to do, but lately, they’ve just been getting hammered over and over again by the kinds of crazy jobs that will wring a guy out. He’s exhausted, and fuck, he needs a vacation.

Maybe like, six vacations. All in a row.

The Nova Corps can call somebody else for their stupid deliveries.

Peter’s mood seems to be shared among the rest of the Guardians. They all stalk off in various directions once they’re back on board the _Quadrant_ : Rocket takes Groot down the corridor, muttering about how he oughta be more careful and, “what the hell were you thinkin’ waving at those damn things? Use some friggin' common sense next time, is that so much to ask?”; Drax excuses himself with a short nod in Peter’s direction, and he can see the big guy heading off towards the training area Gamora had set up on one of the upper decks – dude’s probably gonna punch some shit, and Peter can’t say he blames him; Kraglin and Mantis beat a hasty retreat before Peter can check in on them, and Gamora—

Shit, where did Gamora go?

He only has time to see her disappearing around the corner of one of the halls. She’s off in the direction of her bunk, so… maybe she wants some time alone?

Something heavy sits in the pit of Peter’s stomach when he realizes that. Not that he blames her or anything; Gamora can be a pretty solitary person, and he knows she needs peace and quiet to clear her head (and Peter Quill is anything but “peace and quiet”), but… today was shitty. This _week_ has been shitty, and he finds that all he wants to do is sit with his best friend and maybe commiserate over some godawful alcohol, and then just go the fuck to bed.

… It’s kind of hard to do that when Gamora has up and disappeared, though.

 _But_ Peter knows better than to prod or try to be close when she clearly isn’t going for it, so he doesn’t trail after her. Maybe she just needs to unwind in her own way, and he can respect that.

Instead, he hauls himself off to the captain’s quarters, ditching his jacket, his boots, leaving his Zune on his worktable along with the other little odds and ends that sit there. He hasn’t disturbed much of Yondu’s leftover crap (no matter how many times it hits him that Yondu is _gone_ , that it doesn’t _matter_ what he does with all this shit left behind); it’s still oddly preserved, despite how messy Peter naturally is. His clothes may be all over the place, but Yondu’s knickknacks, his valuables, his holos and wardrobe— Peter hasn’t moved it around, not any more than necessary.

(Peter doesn’t think this place feels like _his_ yet.)

Like the refined man that he is, Peter leaves a trail of clothing behind him on his way to the private bathroom in his quarters. He tells himself he’ll pick it all up later – but, in reality, he probably won’t until he gathers everything up for a gigantic load of laundry. He should wash things at least semi-regularly, Gamora’s told him on _more_ than one occasion, but, you know. Details.

As he stands in the shower with the water beating down on his shoulders, he leans his forehead against the wall with a slow, shuddering sigh. He’d been so close to just flopping down into bed and passing out for the night, but he knows he’s dusty and gross and covered in weird pterodactyl… whatever, so he _needs_ a shower. But, fuck, he just wants to sleep for a year.

Preferably with Gamora.

But apparently that’s not going to be a thing, so he resigns himself to cleaning off and rinsing his hair before he steps out to wrap a towel around his waist. 

Official agenda for the evening: get in bed, stare at ceiling, listen to something he hasn’t heard on the Zune yet. That’s a pretty okay way to send off a shitty week, right?

He’s pushing his hair away from his face as he wanders back out of the shower, scrubbing the heel of his hand over his eyes, but he stops up short when he realizes he’s not alone in his quarters. He immediately refocuses, tense and at attention, ready to respond (despite the fact that he’s basically in nothing but a goddamn towel), and—

There’s Gamora, sitting on his bed with his Zune in her lap, her curls pulled away from her face in some half-braid that’s left a few stray locks of magenta falling around her cheeks. Instead of relaxing, Peter’s breathing just sort of stops for a minute, the wind knocked right out of his sails – and fuck, seeing Gamora _does_ that to him when he doesn’t even realize it.

She doesn’t glance up from the Zune, though she clearly knows he’s there.

“I’m glad you showered,” says Gamora, still not looking up from the MP3 player. One of the earbuds is tucked neatly into her ear, the other hanging freely, though unlike his old headphones, it’s harder to make out what she’s listening to from a distance. “Whatever you fell in today was disgusting.”

Peter wrinkles his nose, something like mock offense. “Hello to you too.” He wanders over to a pile of clothes (clean ones, despite the fact that he hasn’t put them away), plucking up a pair of sweat pants. He looks over his shoulder at her, a little tentative. “You wanna like, turn around for a second or something?”

“I’m fine.”

“… I’m gonna be totally pantsless, dude; this is me warning you.”

“I’m aware of that,” comes the bland reply, but Peter supposes that as long as she’s fine with it, it’s whatever. He shrugs, then abandons the towel in favor of his sweats. He doesn’t think he sees Gamora watching, but he also thinks he might have caught the briefest flicker of her attention before she looks to the Zune again.

It’s only after he turns back around to look at her that he realizes she’s sitting with a bottle of something against her thigh on the bed, and he heaves a massive, relieved sigh.

“God, you’re the best. Like, the actual best.” He wanders to the bed, flopping down next to her and reaching across her lap for the booze. She doesn’t grab his wrist or try to stop him, instead letting him unscrew the cap and take the first swig as she pops the headphone from her ear to set his Zune aside. Peter winces as the liquor hits his tongue, and he swallows with a grimace and a rough exhale. “That shit could melt your eyes right outta your skull. _Damn._ You’re not kiddin’ around today.”

“You looked like you needed it,” she admits. 

Peter looks down at the bottle instead of Gamora, smoothing his thumb over the label. “Not sure what might’ve given you that impression. Couldn’t be more fine. Doing great, actually. I’m the picture of—“

“Peter.”

… Man, she’s good at cutting off his rambling. She doesn’t let him talk circles around himself to bullshit out of any corner he runs into, and as much as he may need that, fuck, he hates it sometimes. She makes it so hard to pretend like he’s fine, to act like nothing’s getting to him – and that’s how he has to be, right? He’s the stupid leader, he has to keep it together at all times.

And it’s _so goddamn hard._

“… I’m okay,” he tries again, somewhat more subdued this time.

“Is that another lie?”

Peter shrugs, and instead of having to speak, he swallows down another mouthful of the… rubbing alcohol? What even is this shit? Strong and _pink_ and probably pilfered from the _Quadrant’s_ little bar.

Whatever, doesn’t matter. It’ll do the job no matter what it tastes like.

He offers the bottle to Gamora after he’s had a third gulp, and though she takes it, she doesn’t immediately move to drink. Shifting closer, she stops when they’re hip-to-hip. 

Peter tenses for all of a second, and then—

He just sort of slumps to the side, leaning against Gamora’s shoulder. An arm curls around his waist, and he feels her turn to make it easier for his forehead to tuck against her throat. Okay, this is… nice, actually. Really, really nice.

He sees her set the bottle down out of the corner of his eye, and then her fingers are winding into his hair, wet as it is, and Peter goes practically boneless against her.

“Fuck,” he breathes.

Gamora presses her lips to the top of his head, and Peter wants to do nothing more than sit and relish this contact. He’s so damn tactile, and he’s sought out ways to fill that need in so many different places, but nothing, _nothing_ soothes him like being close to Gamora.

“Can’t things just go— _sort of_ okay for once? Like, when shit goes sideways, could we maybe not think someone’s going to die for a minute?” His voice is somehow— hoarse. Roughened. He doesn’t lift his head to look at Gamora.

At first, there’s no response. Gamora continues to run fingers through his hair, like she’s taking a moment to compose herself and her answer. “Groot was going to be fine, Peter.” She says it softly, and something about the sympathy beneath it all makes Peter’s gut twist.

“Yeah, well, you didn’t _know_ that. _We_ didn’t know that.” He straightens up, dragging his hand through his hair when he puts distance between them. “And I’m not— I don’t just mean today.”

Quiet falls between them. “… I know.”

Of course she knows. Of course she gets it because Peter feels like a goddamn open book with her, just all laid out on the table so she can see every embarrassing part of himself he usually hides under a quick laugh and a broad grin or the kind of aggravated standoffishness he’d learned to perfect with the Ravagers. She sees through it _all_ , and she leaves him spread out and—

Fuck. He should just go back to drinking.

He reaches for the bottle she set on the ground, not quite able to drag his eyes up to hers. This time, when he straightens up, she sets a hand on his wrist, the other bringing her arm back around so that she can cup his jaw. He doesn’t resist when she tilts his face towards her, but he doesn’t quite raise his eyes to meet that piercing gaze, either.

“We make it through, Peter,” she says, soft and gentle. “It’s what we do.”

And that _is_ how they deal, isn’t it? The Guardians may be losers, and they may have all lost _so damn much_ , but fuck, they’re survivors too. They carry on. They move forward. They _make something of themselves._

Green eyes flicker up to settle on Gamora’s, and that softness is waiting for him there. He’s so used to reading sympathy as _pity_ , but there’s none of that in Gamora’s face now. She doesn’t think he’s pathetic, but she… _feels_ for him instead. She feels _with_ him after all of this bullshit, all this heaviness. Maybe these close calls lately aren’t what’s getting to him. Maybe it’s the remains of a dead man that live in his room like ghosts all their own, and maybe it’s how little he’s let himself— _feel_ everything.

He’d rather keep it all in that dark, tiny box.

But for now, Peter doesn’t say anything. Neither does Gamora. He reaches up to rest a palm on her cheek, drawing their faces together until their foreheads touch.

They _stay_ like that – close, breathing each other in, but they don’t break the silence. They don’t need to. At some point, the bottle is abandoned on the floor once again, and they both end up rearranged on the bed. Peter’s head rests on her stomach as she takes a pillow properly, and she lets him fidget with his Zune for a while as she makes herself comfortable. He passes her one of the earbuds, and in the quiet of his quarters, _Here Comes the Sun_ filters gentle and sweet between them.

As her fingers wind into his hair again, Gamora listens, before she speaks again, “I like this one.” He can’t see it, but he can hear that soft smile he knows has to be there.

“Thought you might.”

They don’t speak for the rest of the night – not really. Some of Peter’s bullshit comments on and off, a mention of a song name or two, but they both seem content with the companionable silence until they’re ready to fall asleep. Peter ends up resituated to rest his head on a pillow, and Gamora curls up against his back, an arm reassuringly tight around his waist as she nuzzles against his neck.

And as shitty as this week has been? This is a pretty great way to end it.


End file.
